1. Technical Field
A method and a device consistent with an exemplary embodiment broadly relate to providing mobile communication provider information to a terminal having an embedded universal integrated circuit card (eUICC).
2. Related Art
A UICC is a smart card available as a tangible module which is inserted into a terminal and configured to perform user authentication with a mobile communication network that a user joins. The UICC may store the user's personal information such as a short message service (SMS) message and a phone book, an international mobile subscriber identity (IMSI), and information about a mobile communication provider that the user of a home public land mobile network (HPLMN) or the like joins.
The UICC may be referred to as a subscriber identity module (SIM) card in the case of a global system for mobile communications (GSM) scheme or a universal subscriber identity module (USIM) card in the case of a wideband code division multiple access (WCDMA) scheme.
When the user mounts the UICC into the terminal, the terminal automatically performs user authentication using information stored in the UICC and therefore, the user may conveniently use the terminal. Also, when the user switches to a new terminal, the user may easily switch to the new terminal while maintain a mobile communication service that the user joined and user information by removing the UICC from an existing terminal and mounting the removed UICC onto or into the new terminal. Alternatively, the user may conveniently change the mobile communication provider by replacing the UICC inserted into the terminal which is currently being used with the UICC of another mobile communication provider.
However, an embedded UICC (hereinafter abbreviated to an “eUICC”) has been proposed to provide the same service as that of a detachable UICC even when the UICC is provided in a structure integrated with a terminal, for example, in a chip type inside the terminal instead of a detachable structure. In this instance, it is difficult to remove the eUICC from the terminal, for example, a structure in which the eUICC is manufactured to be mounted inside a machine to machine (M2M) communication terminal. This type of eUICC is externally difficult to replace. The eUICC may be mounted inside the terminal for durability to avoid damage during a fall or during heat.
Because the eUICC is integrated with the terminal during manufacture, it is difficult to change the mobile communication provider through the detachment of the eUICC due to characteristics of a physical structure in which the eUICC is not detachable from the terminal.
Accordingly, there is a need for a method of remotely providing information of a mobile communication provider to be changed to the eUICC in order to change the mobile communication provider of the terminal on which the eUICC is mounted.
However, a function of providing the information of the mobile communication provider to the eUICC, an interface for the function, and the like has not been specifically defined. Accordingly, there is a disadvantage in that the security is weakened when the method of providing the mobile communication provider information to a terminal having the existing UICC is directly applied to the terminal having eUICC.